wishing everyone Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year

I would like to wish all the members of AusChristmasLighting (ACL) a very merry Christmas and a happy New Year.
We all have reasons for being involved in this hobby and I trust that you all hold that close to your heart and continue to provide joy and happiness to others, be it just friends and family or the thousands that visit displays.
Some thanks are in order as always this year, a year that has seen the forum grow and mature.

To ALL the members of the forum, without you there would be no point. If you’re just starting out then welcome and to the experienced hands may you continue to provide knowledge and guidance that benefits all.
To the forum admins and moderators, another great job well done during another year were I have been largely absent. Many thanks for all the hard work, often thankless and sometimes painful. I know everything is in very good hands.

To the developers of hardware and software I’m sure that all wish you the best, for without you we would have no hobby to pursue.

Personally from me I would like to thank Ed Bryson from J1SYS for his commitment to make hardware that shines the lights and brightens the lives of so many and without which I’m sure this hobby would not be were it is today.

I would encourage all members to send a message of thanks to your hardware or software developer, commercial or community, for without them this hobby would be significantly harder.

If you got this far and want to avoid the self indulgent ramble then skip this bit and go to the end.
What an interesting year I had. After being completely stressed out in 2011 and having a year off I got back on deck for 2012 and started the year with many plans not many of which came to life. The forum moved to be hosted in a datacentre and on fast stable hardware thanks to the generosity of a forum member. We also setup donations to build a monetary base to cover various costs that occur in running a forum of this size. To date these funds remain untouched so as to cover future costs, thanks to all who have donated. Domain names etc are fully paid up.
I got to attend the Brisbane and Adelaide minis and met many great people, travelled 4500 odd kilometres over 10 days and had a absolute blast.

Then we had a downturn, I failed to win the job I had been acting in for nearly four years during the interview process. We then went on six months more acting with 2 performance reviews before an assessment to be appointed for the role. This changed my focus to be 100% work and no time to play with the performance review period scheduled to run till mid November even the thought of my own display was distant. Then during this time my mother went in to have significant surgery on her foot to reconstruct a lot of the bones, at 86 and at least 4 months in a wheelchair this has been a trial for her. A week after the surgery she suffered a heart attack when being transported home and ended up with another three weeks in hospital. She has not long got out of the wheelchair to moving around with a walking frame though her foot is still encased in a plaster boot.

Oh the good news is that on Dec 6th i was appointed to the position.

Like 2011 the display this year was in serious doubt and it was friends and neighbours that got it to happen. Took three days a week off in November to build some new bits and put things together. Those few bits turned into nearly 80% of the display being freshly constructed and a project that ran so overtime that not one song was sequenced till the 10th December and the 5th song was completed on the 20th with the last major element going up on the 16th! Just maybe I need a different project manager next year.
Crowds have been up though and donations for the charity we support look like they will exceed last year as long as the weather stays fine.

Trivia Facts for this years display
Only 11k lights down from 31k last year, with around 20k normal leds not being used this year.
Pixel count went up to 5296 this year (15,888 ch) with about 40 channels for non pixel lights. So we have more channels than lights.
The software we used this year has been LightFactory and a special thanks to Martin for the support and software.
Those 16,000 channels have been spread across 53 DMX universes with output from the computer exclusively E131.
Despite the decrease to what many would see as a tiny amount of lights the many return visitors I have had a chance to speak to have commented about how much better the display is this year so maybe more is not always better.

Despite my personal aversion to the social media juggernaut of Facebook I joined to create a page for the lights to see if we could encourage more people along.www.facebook.com/XMASLightsOnTillyardDrive
Some members have already found the page.

Anyway enough of my rambling

All the very best for Christmas day and may 2013 be a year to enjoy and prosper.
Best wishes and kindest regards
Aussiephil
May your display bring happiness and joy to all that visit.

PS: sent this out as a newsletter and forget to add the subject line....

Welcome back Phil.
I am sure I can speak for most here and say a big thankyou for the help and support over thelast 12 months. Without the input from you, FastEddy and the rest , a lot of us would still be stumbling around in the dark (excuse the pun).
Again thanks for your support, hope you have a better year in 2013 and have a great and safe Christmas and New year
Doug